Thursday, January 28, 2016

I went for an afternoon solo paddle. There was a bit of a SW breeze so i decided to hug the Cadboro-Oak Bay shore and paddle to the marina. As I got to about the 2 km mark, it started to rain quite hard and the wind became much stronger (making it hard to paddle around Cattle Point! The gusts at RVYC were up to 50 kph...). By the time I had made it to the Oak Bay tea house the rain had stopped and the dark sky had disappeared to be replaced by a blue one. There is a seal at Oak bay Marina that claps its flippers for fish! I was also trying to see if the pebble smartwatch did a decent job of recording paddle strokes. My initial observation is that it is not reliably indicating strokes... More testing to come. I also paddled without gloves for the first time in a month or so. It did not seem that cold!

Sunday, January 24, 2016

Rob and I went for a morning paddle around Discovery. We were on the water at 0830 and back just after 11. We paused briefly around boathouse bay to chat with Olivier and then again on the north side of Discovery for snacks and water. We also poked into "heron cove" and played a bit in the "sluice" before paddling back across Baynes. The clear sky gradually clouded over and the wind started to pick up a little when we returned. We had nice calm conditions and the currents were no problem either. Lots of seals and seabirds!

Thursday, January 14, 2016

I went for a short solo paddle around the bay with the surf ski. There was a 10-15 kt east wind which slowed me down between Flower Island and Cadboro Point, but the rest of the trip was fast with a 7.3 kph average speed for the 6.5 km trip. It was pretty lumpy off Cadboro Point as the ebb current was building. It looked like there were some 4+ foot waves. It is so nice to be able to get out for a short paddle!

Sunday, January 10, 2016

Dan and I went for a mid- morning paddle around Discovery. Conditions were nice and calm with a light wind that was enough for the sailboats (see below). We did a non-stop run and took 2 hrs and 20 minutes to do the 15 km trip, for an average of 6.1 kph (3.3 kt). Mt Baker was clear and we could just make out the shadow of Mt Rainier in the far distance. Lots of long-tailed (oldsqaw) ducks around. It was definitely a bit harder work on the return. Not sure if this was current or wind or both.

Someone asked me how often I go around Discovery, so I checked the blog for last year and tallied up 23 times - almost twice a month! (only 3x so far this month!) I do like these islands!

Saturday, January 09, 2016

I led a SISKA paddle with 17 others around Discovery. It was a beautiful, mostly sunny, day, and the wind was a brisk 10+kt from the north. We had calm conditions throughout except for crossing Baynes, where it was a bit lumpy. We ran into Lanny and Paulo who were going round the island in the opposite direction. We saw plenty of birds and had a nice visit to "cactus islet". An excellent paddle.

Sunday, January 03, 2016

I have been lazy about taking pictures while paddling of late, so I decided to try a few today... The first group are trying to recreate a photo I took many years ago with Paulo, Dennis and Dan. The picture that is currently my FB cover photo. The wolf is a small dot in the last image!

Dan, Dennis, Paulo and I went for a middle of the day paddle (we thought by waiting until later it might be warmer!) around Discovery. There was a brisk northerly wind and a strong ebb building. You can see from the track that we were going fast when we had the wind and current at our back. The water around Seabird Point/Discover Island Light was pretty lumpy, but as soon as we got into the lee of Rudlin bay it was calm and we had a nice lunch stop in the sun. As we rounded the west side of Discovery we spotted the wolf. I had not seen it in quite some time and it was good to see it again. It came as close as 40 m from me while I was trying to take pictures, The sluice was running fast and where it turned north, the current and waves made for some steep, lumpy water. Looking at the track you can see how the current took us to our left (W) in spite of pointing and paddling hard to the NW! A very fine paddle! Photos to come as a follow up.

Friday, January 01, 2016

I joined Jennie and 7 others for a relaxed SISKA paddle to Willows beach. We "noodled" along the shore checking out all the nooks and crannies and keeping in the lee of the cool north wind. Visibility was great again with the silhouette of Mt Rainier visible in the distance past Seattle! The winds at RVYC and 10 mile point were a pretty steady 10-15 knots directly from the north with occasional gusts over 15. We encountered a bit of lumpy water off Cattle point, but otherwise were able to find calm lee areas. It was nice to get a start on my next year's paddling goal - almost done 1%! :)